Starsinger

Vivalta

Perception returned to Aaron, slowly at first. His muscles were stiff from lying still for too long, cuffed and gagged. Voices he didn't recognize drifted around him. The burn scabs on his arm were wet and painful. Bleeding. He opened his eyes in the darkness and twisted around. Obsidian shackles gleamed at his wrists. Around him the walls were slatted wood and stained with salt. He was on a ship, but not the Drake.

The Bloodhound.

"Get up."

A hard boot shoved Aaron onto his back, making him cough. The man above him was wider than he was tall, with arms as thick as tree trunks and a formidable mustache. They were alone in a small, dank brig, a single shaft of light bearing down from the deck above. A spasm of fear clutched at Aaron's chest. His team wasn't with him.

The man – sailor, must have been – grabbed the back of Aaron's tunic and yanked him into a sitting position. Aaron slid one leg underneath himself and pushed up, rising halfway before a wave of dizziness hit and he toppled over onto the large man. He hadn't eaten in – what, a day? Two?

"Pathetic." The sailor shoved Aaron off of him and he landed hard against the wooden floor.

"What's the hold up?"

"Last fellow can't stand," shouted the man, and behind him another silhouette appeared, topped with a wide-brimmed feather hat.

Aaron bared his teeth. Captain Niko crouched down, tilting his head to meet Aaron's gaze.

He killed Matty. Aaron wanted to lunge, wanted to smash the smirk off the captain's face. What did he do with the rest of them? A hundred images flashed through Aaron's mind – Raelyn, bound and beaten, Delia tortured with void magic, Jace with a sword buried in his gut, Sapphire—

"You were the one in the manse. Getting handsy with the blue-haired girl." Niko grinned when he saw Aaron's eyes widen. "Blue hair is rather distinctive. I guess you were too distracted by her other parts to notice it had sprung free, hmm?"

Aaron had noticed. But it was so quick, he thought Niko must have missed it. Why should Sapphire's hair even matter to the captain?

He knows who we are. Dread sank in Aaron's gut. Like the mercenaries they'd narrowly evaded in the Wistful Wood, Captain Niko had been looking for them. For Raelyn. For the blue-haired scout who traveled with her.

"Don't feel too bad," Niko said. "It wasn't all your fault I figured it out. Hawkins gave you away there too, taunting me about fires in Easthold when explosions had gone off across half the island. Why'd she just want to talk about Easthold, I wondered? What are the chances?"

Captain Niko reached down and yanked the gag out of Aaron's mouth. "Who told you about the warehouse?"

Aaron spat on the floor. "You can go—"

An emptiness swelled in his brain, and Aaron couldn't remember the word for the things he wanted to tell Niko to go do to himself. He was relapsing, all the fury and fear bringing back the void magic injury he thought he'd overcome. He tried to force the words to return, clenching his jaw with concentration. Nothing.

Niko raised an eyebrow. "You stupid or something?"

Aaron spat again, this time catching Niko in the face. The captain reared back, wiping the spittle from his cheek disgustedly.

"Get him up," said Niko.

The wide sailor heaved Aaron to his feet and shoved him toward the ladder to the top deck. Aaron caught himself on the rungs and began to climb awkwardly, the obsidian shackles clanking with each pull.